


A Night in Hell

by ShippingLikeAPackage



Category: Mystic Messenger (Video Game)
Genre: F/M, Fair amount of swearing, Mint Eye, Prologue Bad End, Saeran - Freeform, magenta - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-13
Updated: 2016-10-13
Packaged: 2018-08-22 04:34:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,069
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8273024
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShippingLikeAPackage/pseuds/ShippingLikeAPackage
Summary: When conditions are so grim and life is so miserable, sleep can be very evasive.Unless you have a little help.





	

_Thump._

Your knee made contact with the wall… again. Man, was this bed tinier than usual? You’d think after 35 days and 22 hours in eternal damnation… Er, **_Magenta_** , you’d have gotten used to the living conditions by now. But, no. The bed still felt small, the food still made you retch, the icy shower water still made you scream every time you stepped in, the lack of sunlight in the dormitory/workplace itself still strained your eyes. Among other things, to boot.

            Life wasn’t good. Life in “Paradise” was actually quite miserable. And here you stayed, as both hostage and prisoner.

            Rolling over, you did your best to squeeze your eyes shut, at least _attempting_ to clear your mind from the horrible reality, while trying not to scold yourself once more for ever replying on that dumb suspicious app. You should’ve reset your phone, deleted all traces once you saw that green binary code. That was your warning sign, a big red flag telling you this Unknown was no good, and yet you had to be naïve and promise him your assistance.

            And then you had to be stubborn about it and insist upon there being no lock on the door when there so clearly was.

            You squinted to read the mint green display of the digital clock on one of your captor’s many large monitors: it was the only electronic awake and alive at the moment. All of the other screens remained dormant, awaiting his nimble fingers to input the passcode to access his work the next morning.

            **_4:38 AM_**

            Four thirty-eight. You knew you’d be woken at 6:40 to begin ‘assisting’, just like you were every other day. And yet here you lie, at 4:38, having not slept a wink since the night before.

            A small groan escaped from between your lips, as you rubbed your eyes harshly, able to feel just how tired you were, yet, unable to will yourself into a slumber.

            No matter how many positions you tried, no matter how many sheep you counted, your eyes kept springing back open. Thoughts buzzed around your head, recycled by this point, because when you were restless, there was nothing else to do but try to sleep and _think_.

_Bump._

This time it was your foot striking the bedpost, amidst you shifting to sprawl on your stomach and hope that it produced more fruitful results. The quiet noise elicited an almost pained moan from the seemingly-lifeless lump across your room, whose silhouette you could just barely differentiate, even with your eyes adjusted ever since lights-out, which was hours ago.

            _Oh, right,_ you reminded yourself, tearing your eyes away from him and shifting to lay back and stare at the ceiling once more, as if this time would be different. You weren’t alone in this room: you shared it with HIM, the guy who single-handedly ruined your life and probably got your face on some milk cartons.

            Huffing in frustration, you screwed your eyes shut once more, begging, pleading with your body to cooperate and just slip out of consciousness. Squirming onto your right side once more and facing the wall, you curled yourself slightly, hoping maybe that would make the difference that made you successful in your attempts.

            But in doing so, all you achieved was accidentally kicking the heap of clothes at the foot of your bed onto the floor, and they landed on a dinner plate you hadn’t bothered to put away in rebellion to being here. It tipped up before rattling down onto the hard floor again, the noise seeming amplified in the small and otherwise quiet room.

            “For _God’s sake…_ ” A groggy tone muttered, one which you knew to be Saeran’s real voice, what he sounded like without the creepy, speech-altering mask he occasionally wore.

            The one he wore when he snatched you right out of that apartment building.

            In the time it took you to identify the noise as his, the other bed rustled and there was a _thump thump thump_ as the young man stomped over to you, his white-and-pink hair in even more of a mess than usual due to bedhead. He slept in a tank top underneath a sweatshirt that hung loosely off of his frame… Were all his clothes like that? It made him looks small, and it almost proudly displayed the cultish markings and tattoos laced all over his skin… It was really… Intimidating.

            Especially when he had grabbed you by the collar of your shirt and lifted you out of bed, causing you to stumble to your feet, startled. As awake as you were, you weren’t entirely fully-functional, and hadn’t put two and two together yet to realize that he was coming over to you, so the sudden tossing-about startled you. “You’ve been making noise for _over an hour._ Sleep, for Christ’s sake. And more importantly, shut _the fuck up._ ” Saeran hissed his words, not entirely awoken yet either, and just narrowed his piercing eyes at your frame, making his words an official threat.

            “Sleep?” The word rolled off your tongue drenched in cynics, and you almost gave a damn laugh, too. Maybe this place was finally driving you insane. “I’m in a living hell here. Of course I can’t fucking sleep.”

            His grip on you tightened, and you braced for it: a smack in the face, being casted to the ground, maybe even thrown into the bedside table. He’d been violent before. You’d seen it, with the other guards that came to visit and delivered food… And those were his colleagues. You were just some plaything he kept trapped under lock-and-key here, and now, you’d really pissed him off, so you could only imagine what he’d do to _you._

            But… of all the things you braced yourself for, being picked up and gingerly placed in his lap as he sat on his bed was not one of them. He’d seen you reel back and flinch, and that… Why did that make him feel _guilty?_ You were nothing but a nuisance, one that was, particularly tonight, a problem he lost sleep over. The lanky boy let out a low defeated groan, looping his arms around your waist to ensure you weren’t going anywhere. He didn’t have the energy to deal with an escapee right now, especially when he was about to be nice.

            “It’s… It’s not hell.” He spoke quietly, and after gathering up that sentence, Saeran let out a small mewl of a yawn, his eyes lazily opening up to look blankly at the floor. “It’s _Paradise._ I… I couldn’t… This is a place where you’re safe. Where nothing can hurt you. Where you’re… Not compared against anyone else…” The chilling green eyes drooped shut as he internalized his own words, and the silence gave you a moment to process what in the world was going on. You almost snipped out a comment about how ‘nothing can hurt you’ and yet everyone here is more physically violent than the UFC. Almost. But you didn’t, and he continued on.

            “This is where your problems don’t matter. Where the past is forgotten… Where you are loved. Where no matter how bad of a person you are… or how much you don’t deserve anything good… You’re still given it. A… perfect and hopeful place… A safe place. And we’re… a part of it…”

            He’d begun to sway in the middle of his soft speech, and by the time he’d begun trailing his sentences, Saeran was laying in his bed once more, you dragged along with him in the vice grip that refused to release you. But his movements had been so fluid, and you were so out of it, that you hardly even noticed the shift in position.

            “I… Originally was gonna use you… But now… You have to understand… This is our paradise…The place… Where everyone’s happy… The Magenta of dreams and… hope… So go to sleep…”

            Those lines rung a bell- they were the exact message of the recruitment email you’d been ordered to send hundreds of since becoming trapped here. But hearing him speak, it was clear that he truly believed them, that they weren’t just a flowery slogan, that they were his… everything.

            You almost smiled in amusement in the fact he could recite them off the top of his head, and very gently shifted to increase the distance between you two just a bit, since he still, well, was dangerous, in your eyes. At least, sometimes he was.

            “You _were_ going to use me?” He talked in the past tense, which caught your attention. Maybe it was just one of those late-at-night things, but… He did originally promise, way back then, that he’d be good to you… Was he finally planning on coming through with that? “What do you mean?”

            The pause was longer than it should have been, so you decided to crane your head back and dared to sneak a peek at his face. The boy’s hair flopped back out of his face messily, his eyes were shut and his mouth was slightly agape. He almost looked peaceful, for once, and you could honestly say that was the first time you’d seen him as such.

            This was all well and good, but it didn’t exactly solve your problem of being unable to sleep. In fact, it solved _his,_ not yours. And… Now, you were trapped, because even in his unconscious state, Saeran wasn’t letting you free from his grasp.

            Goodie.

            That said, nature will do as nature does, and bodies will follow instincts. So when Saeran’s breathing leveled out into a steady rhythm, you found your own lungs joining in on the pattern: in… and out… and in… and out…

            The more rhythmic your movements became, the more your muscles released their tension, and the more tension released, the heavier your eyelids became, until you were gone as well, a quiet snore threatening to escape once you’d hit your well-earned deep sleep.

.

.

. 

            “Mmmmngh…” The unattractive sound fell out of your mouth involuntarily upon waking up, as you didn’t want to leave the warmth your bed gave you just yet. You buried your face into the pillow you were hugging, before your eyebrows scrunched in confusion. This pillow felt real unsupportive, and smelled… not like your other pillows. An eye peeked open, before both, before you reeled back, examining the object in your hands, because it sure as hell wasn’t a pillow. It didn’t even have a shape to it, and when given a minute of examination, you recognized it as an article of clothing. A sweater.

            Turning over, you sleepily squinted in the direction of all the lights: all of the monitors were on, and there was a quiet ticking of fingers grazing nimbly across a keyboard as many things were displayed: a strand of binary code on one screen, some sort of group chatroom on another, a profile with a picture of some red-haired boy on a third…

            “Oh, you’re awake.” His voice jostled you away from your thoughts, although the man in the chair never looked at you, or tore his eyes off the screens before him.

            He was in a maroon tank top, not having bothered to change out of his pajamas yet. But wasn’t he wearing a jacket the night before…?

            A sweater. His sweater, you realized. “Wait why is this…”

            “You were clinging onto it when I woke up this morning.” He jammed some keys with a sense of finality before curtly swiveling to you, his face blank and unreadable. “You hadn’t slept much, so I just took it off instead of disturbing you.”

            Sitting up, you tilted your head, and consciously told yourself to release your tight grip on the sweater. “O-oh, I…”

            “I’ll take it back now. Unless you still…?” Wanted it? You shook your head sheepishly, tossing it in his direction. The boy caught it easily, and slipped it on, before turning back to his work. “It’s good you woke up. I was going to wake you soon, if not. It’s almost lunch time.”

            Peering at the largest of the screens, you confirmed his words: it was 11:47 AM. He’d let you sleep in, bothered to take off his sweater as to not wake you up, and lulled you to sleep last night… Who would’ve guessed…?

 

            …Maybe, just maybe, this place wasn’t so hellish after all.


End file.
